Dissertation Project:
Networks, Neighborhoods and Place-Based Identities Across the Urban-Rural Divide and their Effect on Political Behavior
Working Papers:
Tied to Place: Social Networks, Connectivity, and Rural–Urban Political Divergence
Bounded Communities, Bounded Identities? How Geographic Social Closure Strengthens Place-Based Identity and Affective Polarization
Beyond Redistribution? How Material, Political, And Symbolic Inclusion Shape Support For Compensation Policies Among Rural Residents In Germany (with Isolde Hegemann) [Abstract] Does recognizing place-based identities and including local communities increase approval for compensation policies across the urban-rural divide? Rural areas are often more skeptical toward policies where costs, benefits, or cultural implications are geographically concentrated and experienced differently across the urban-rural divide. Existing research has shown that compensation policies can alleviate concerns around such costly policies. However, these studies have not explored non-material features of compensation policies that may affect their approval. We argue that compensation policies become more successful where they feature the political and symbolic inclusion of rural communities. To test the effects of material, political, and symbolic inclusion on policy support, we field a pre-registered conjoint survey experiment in April 2026 in Germany. Respondents are presented with proposals on climate and immigration compensation policies. We find that local democratic inclusion, symbolic place-based recognition, and holistic community spending each independently increase rural policy support and that rural residents are willing to make substantial trade offs in material compensation for meaningful democratic participation and community recognition. These findings have direct implications for how governments design compensation policies in an era of constrained public budgets and deepening place-based resentment.
Echoes of the Picket Line: Political Legacy Effects of the 1984–85 UK Miners’ Strike (with Franziska Veit)[Abstract] The 1984-1985 United Kingdom coal miners’ strike is widely regarded as one of the biggest and most consequential industrial disputes in modern British history. Beyond its immediate economic and social effects, the strike is often described as a profoundly politicizing event. Leveraging an original dataset linking historical coal mine closures to local and national election outcomes, we employ a Differences-in-Differences design to estimate the long-term effects of strike-related closures on voting behavior in English constituencies between 1974 and 2020. We also use harmonized longitudinal data from (UKHLS, 1991–2023) with MSOA-level geographic identifiers to examine effects on political attitudes. Preliminary findings show that individuals in areas with strike-related mine closures show lower levels of political efficacy and democratic satisfaction compared to individuals in unaffected mining areas, and that these effects seem to persist, while effects on voting behavior appear less consistent. The results have implications for how core political experiences shape long-term political attitudes, as well as the legacy effects of rapid deindustrialization and the political conflict it produced.
On the Right Track? Improving Local Transport Provision and Its Political Consequences (with Julius Kölzer)
Economic Inequality, Social Insulation and Political Polarization in the UK (with Miriam Sorace, Irene Rodriguez and Tarek Jaziri Arjona)